Abstract

The wide-spread use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) in language learning has not only provided more varied forms of learning for adults but has also posed a number of challenges for language teachers who now need to be multiskilled: They have to be knowledgeable about the ICT tools available for language teaching, able to decide whether a particular tool is consistent with their underlying pedagogic approach, and confident in the use of suitable tools so as to ensure that these tools meet the needs of their learners. It is therefore crucial for language teachers to receive support and encouragement to use ICT tools (more) confidently and to develop their skills further.
The DOTS (Developing Online Teaching Skills, http://dots.ecml.at) and MoreDOTS (Using open resources to develop online teaching skills) projects, which have been supported by the European Centre for Modern Languages (ECML, www.ecml.at) since 2008, address teachers’ needs for support by providing a Moodle-based workspace (http://moodle.dots.ecml.at), containing bite-sized training modules and the opportunity to share experience and language teaching materials with other language teachers in Europe (Beaven et al., 2010; Stickler et al., 2010).

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